A Cook's Tour (22 page)

     This time around, I had a definite agenda. At the top of my list was Edomae sushi. Edo was the old name for Tokyo, and the term
Edomae
when used with the word
sushi
implies that it’s old-school, Edo-style, the unvarnished grand-master version of sushi (in a culture where sushi is already revered). Michiko had introduced me to Mr Kiminari Togawa, the chef/owner of the Karaku restaurant in the expensive Ginza district and a master of Edomae sushi.

     While I had visited the awe-inspiring, life-changing mother of all fish markets before, this time I would be going with an expert. The plan was to meet Togawa-san at his restaurant, run over to Tsukiji to do his day’s shopping, then return to his restaurant and eat myself silly. I’ve written about Tsukiji in the past, and used up most of the superlatives I can think of. Just take my word for it: It’s the Taj Mahal, the Colosseum, the Great Pyramid of seafood. All that unbelievable bounty, spread across acres and acres of concrete, wriggling and spitting from tanks, laid out in brightly colored rows, carefully arranged like dominoes in boxes, skittering and clawing from under piles of crushed ice, jockeyed around on fast-moving carts, the smell of limitless possibilities, countless sensual pleasures – I am inadequate to the task of saying more. There is nowhere else. Believe me.

     This time, instead of simply gaping, slack-jawed, I was doing it right. Mr Togawa was with me, and when the fish sellers saw him coming, it got their attention. A friendly but serious fellow of about my age, Togawa-san was looking for a few select items today: fresh live eels, live octopus, sea bream, tiger prawn, and
o-toro
– the best of the best of the tuna – in season. We spent a lot of time yanking living creatures out of fish tanks and examining them. Mr Togawa showed me something I hadn’t seen before. Lifting a flipping and flopping sea bream out of a tank, he took a knife and whacked it behind the head with the blade. The cut opened it up just enough to expose the spine. Mr Togawa quickly took a long, thin wire and inserted it into the fish’s marrow, running it up and down its length like a deep root canal. He explained that he was basically paralyzing the sea bream. The fish would live – in a comalike state of suspended animation – until the very last second, back in Mr Togawa’s kitchen, when he’d finish the job. Walking down one of the busy aisles, the chef caught sight of a large square of fatty
toro
, and he veered over to examine it more closely. After gazing at it reflectively for a while, and a little discussion with the fishmonger, the piece of tuna went in a bag. We bought a few kilos of very lively eels, an octopus – which very reluctantly released its grip on the glass walls of its tank – some brightly colored prawns, then headed back to Ginza.

     The chef’s cooks were waiting for us when we arrived, and they immediately fell on the morning’s shopping. They salted and pounded the octopus for slow cooking in mirin (rice wine), then butchered the tuna and sorted various parts for different purposes. The small, stark cellar space was soon filled with the smell of steaming rice and freshly grated ginger and wasabi. There came the sound – beautiful really, almost musical – of a very sharp knife cutting through the tiny pinbones of a very fresh fish, the blade scraping quickly along the spine with an extended
ZiiiipppP
! The cooks’ blades moved confidently through the eels, then finished off the sea bream with that distinctive sound:
Ziiip!
Ziiip!
I sat at the sushi bar, watching them work, until, embarrassed by my growling stomach, I withdrew to a table.

     Finally, as zero hour approached, Michiko, Shinji, and I took our places in a small, private tatami room. Hot towels and cold beer were served; then one of the doors slid open and we were off.

     Octopus with fresh wasabi – the color and shape of a cherry blossom – came first; then grilled sardine with
ponzu
sauce and
yuzu
, the flavor electric, dazzling; followed by a platter of traditional sushi, each piece, as should be the case with Edomae sushi, containing a nearly identical number of grains of rice – and, as is also the style with Edomae, still warm and more loosely packed than the cold, gluey rice cakes you might be used to. I’d watched Mr Togawa make some of these earlier for another customer. His hands flew, twirled, an entire ballet with ten digits. It had taken him, he told me, three years, during his training and apprenticeship, just to be considered as having mastered rice alone. For three years in his first kitchen, it had been all he’d been allowed to touch.

     Half-beak came next, a pointy-nosed transluscent little fish, silvery and alive-looking, then maguro (the lean section of a tuna), marinated twelve hours, tiger prawns, flounder,
o-toro
, all served over the sticky yet fluffy rice, which was still warm. Everything – every fish (except the toro) – was from the Tokyo area. All of it was of the absolute highest quality. No price is too high for the best fish. And with Edomae sushi, one always buys the best.

     The meal continued in an uninterrupted flow of delights: a miso soup with tiny steamed cockles, a course of pickles and microgreen salad, a slice of
tamago
(omelette), big shell (whatever that is), abalone, sea eel. Was the meal over? No way! A tray of hand rolls came next: sea cucumber, ark shell, more eel, dried radish with powdered, dried king prawns, chopped
toro
with fresh chives. Bigger hand rolls arrived, each containing
tamago
(egg), shiitake, and cucumber, accompanied by a plate of dried, then pickled daikon. The sea bream appeared squeaky-fresh; it seemed alive on my plate. Then we were served a little bowl of butterfish roe poached in court bouillon, some luxuriously portioned
uni
(sea urchin roe).

     The screen slid back and Mr Togawa joined us with a jumbo-sized bottle of frozen sake. He sat down and poured me a glass of frozen, delicious, slushy goodness. In keeping with local custom, I poured back, returning the favor. This usually initiates a lengthy back-and-forth, and that day was no exception. Just when the beer and the frozen sake had combined to give us all mild, blissful grins, a final dish arrived: a few pieces of that incredible
o-toro
, lightly seared, still raw in the middle, with a subtle sweet-and-sour sauce. Perfect.

   
Perfect
. The best sushi ever. The best. Far and away. Let me repeat: the best, finest, freshest, best-prepared sushi meal I’ve ever had. It took every bit of discipline I had not to moan and giggle and gush throughout the meal. If you’re reading this, Togawa-san, and you ever need a favor at four o’clock in the morning, anywhere in the world, I’m there for you. You showed me the light.

     That night, my belly still distended from lunch, I strolled over to the old train station and Yurakucho alley, where the air was heavy with the smell of grilling chicken parts and caramelizing marinade. Every little chicken joint, every low-to-the-ground stool and upended beer-crate table, was packed with salarymen drinking and eating yakitori on skewers. I wandered for a while, amazed to find my appetite returning. Down one dark and narrow street, I found a single free stool next to a large and raucous group of business people, all from the same government office, letting loose after a hard day. One of them, in a gregarious mood, reached over and pulled my table near theirs, offering warm greetings and a big portion of hot sake. In a mix of broken English and slurred Japanese, we made introductions, and I found myself plunged unexpectedly into yet another orgy of drinking and eating. Trays of skewered yakitori – ground chicken balls, gizzards, marinated cartilage, and breast and leg meat – began arriving. As soon as my glass was half-empty, someone would fill it. Food kept coming, and soon everyone at the table was making jokes, telling stories, complaining about their spouses. One celebrant at the opposite end of the table slumped periodically onto his outstretched arm, unconscious, waking only for more sake. The others gave him little notice. My stated mission, to eat my way around the world, got a lot of interest. Suggestions rang out from every direction.

     ‘Bourdain-san! You try
chanko
?’

     ‘Bourdain-san! You go for
onsen
?
Kaiseki
food? Very good!’

     A pile of stripped skewers accumulated at each end of the table. The sake kept coming. Soon, one of the salarymen was demonstrating what might have been the twist, others making incomprehensible (in any language) mother-in-law jokes. There was a spirited discussion on the subject of who was cooler: Iron Chef Morimoto (my choice) or Iron Chef Sakai (the popular favorite). I did my best to explain the American reaction to the Bobby Flay ‘cutting board incident’ during the first Flay/Morimoto face-off, an event seen by many Japanese, apparently, as the culinary equivalent of the Tyson/Holyfield ear-chewing debacle.

     It turned into a very long night of backslapping, drink-spilling, and loud exchanges of ‘
Kanpai
!’ (Cheers!). Just before the evening threatened to veer dangerously into karaoke, I made sincere gestures of gratitude and appreciation and staggered home, leaving at least two of the party sleeping deeply, face down in their seats.

We are barbarians. We are big, hairy, smelly, foreign devils, unsophisticated, loud, clumsy, overexpressive, and overfed, blundering thoughtlessly through life. At least that’s how you might feel when preparing yourself for the
ryokan
experience. The Japanese – those that can afford it – like to unwind and relax. They like skiing. They adore golf. Fly-fishing is an obsession. But the traditional way to kick back is to spend a weekend at a
ryokan
, a country inn, usually in a rural area in the mountains, away from city life. There, one can spend a few days in quiet reflection, soaking in
onsen
(hot springs), enjoying the healthy benefits of a massage, perhaps taking in a little musical entertainment, and dining on
kaiseki
, the most refined, sophisticated style of eating in Japan. An outgrowth of the tea ceremony,
kaiseki
is the national version of haute cuisine, an experience designed to appeal to all the senses, and one’s spirit, in equal proportion, as well as one’s sense of history and location – a complete yin/yang workup. What better way for a stressed-out office drone to lose himself completely to pleasure than to step back for a few days into the sixteenth century?

     Nervously waiting for the
shinkansen
, the bullet train, to the seaside town of Atami, I was becoming painfully aware of my otherness.
Kaiseki
, like no other Japanese cuisine, offers a minefield of possible behavioral gaffes to the uninformed Westerner like myself. Now, I know how to use chopsticks. By New York standards, I’m impressive. But while reading up on proper dining etiquette at a
kaiseki
meal, the customary practices and procedures when staying at a
ryokan
, my heart filled with dread and terror.

Don’t point your chopsticks at anyone else.

Do not allow the soles of your feet to be exposed to anyone else.

Do not step on the wooden dividers between mats.

Never leave your chopsticks sticking straight up out of your food.

When drinking soup or tea, it’s one hand under, palm up, the other cradling around from the side.

If it’s a soup with chunks, hold your chopsticks thus, and lift the bowl to your lips to sip from it.

Do not drown your sushi in soy sauce; to leave granules of rice floating in your dipping sauce is the height of bad taste and brutishness.

When your geisha pours you sake (hot sake with cold food; cold sake with hot), wash your cup after drinking and pour her some into the same receptacle.

That was
not
a finger bowl.

Wash for dinner. Really wash.

Dress appropriately.

Remember to remove your sandals before entering the room.

     No experience is more guaranteed to make you feel like a nine-hundred-pound ape than a
kaseiki
dinner for which you are inadequately briefed. I was very jittery. Shinji had driven me to the station in his personal car, a tiny Renault two-seater convertible, top down. I’d sat in the miniature front seat, my head protruding out beyond the windshield, feeling freakish, huge, and bumbling. I knew I would soon be looking sillier and feeling more awkward than I had since sixth grade, when I’d briefly attended a ballroom-dancing class. The memory of that particular horror still makes my hands sweat and my face burn with shame.

     The
shinkansen
are magnificent machines. They slide quietly into train stations, their great bug-spattered nose cones looking like space shuttles. A cleaning crew in pink outfits rushed on board as soon as mine arrived. A few minutes later, liftoff. I was on my way to Atami, gliding at high speed through the outskirts of Tokyo, a
bento
box of
unagi
(eel) and rice and a cold Asahi in front of me. The bullet trains can reach speeds of 270 klicks an hour. Mine moved like a high-speed serpent. From the rear of the train, I could watch the front of it as it whipped like a snake head past Mount Fuji’s snow-capped peak, through mountains, fields, small towns, and tunnels, the sea appearing and disappearing to my left as the train hissed through space. About an hour later, I was in Atami, climbing the steep, twisting mountain roads in a taxi. It was sunny and relatively warm for wintertime. Up and up we went, one impossibly angled switchback after another, until we pulled into the hidden driveway of Ryokan Sekiyou, near a mountaintop high over the sea.